Origins: My Mother-in-Law

Subject: Origins: My Mother-in-Law
From: Goose Gander
Date: 16 Jan 08 - 02:11 PM

My Mother-in-Law

As sung by Mrs. Sullivan at Shafter, 1940

Now friends if you'll listen
I'll sing you a ditty
Of the ugliest old woman
That ever you saw.

She is so ugly
She frightens the children
When they go for a walk
Out on the street.

With a hole in her head
Like a crack in a punkin
And a hump on her back
And such very large feet.

O my life is all trouble
No pleasure I see
Wherever I go
That old lady watches me.

I'd rather be drug off
To jail or to congress
Then spend all my life with
My mother-in-law.

I told that old lady
When I married her daughter
I didn't intend
The whole family to wed.

Then quickly she picked up
A bucket of water
And taking good aim
Let fly at my head.

O my life is all trouble
No pleasure I see
Wherever I go
That old lady watches me.

Meade's Country Music Sources credits this to German-dialect comedian Gus Williams (1876), but I haven't been able to locate the original. Interestingly, this is one of the few German-American music hall songs that made it into tradition.

Subject: RE: Origins: My Mother-in-Law
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 16 Jan 08 - 02:52 PM

I've checked several of the digital sheet music collections (Hist.Am.Sheets, Levy, Indiana, UCLA, Baylor, Bodleian, Nat.Lib.Australia and a couple of others) without finding it (although Williams used the first 2 lines in Gus Williams' German Band).

There are (at least) two other collected version in the Max Hunter Collection (Nos.1033 and 1077 from 1969 and 1972 respectively).

The Bodleian Library appears to hold 2 copies of a song My Mother-In-Law from London, 1877, one specifying from Ward, Lock &Co's Humorous Songs, but not composer appears to be given and there's not text available to check if it's the same song.

Sorry it's all negative.

Mick